THE DEFENDER #5 ENTRAPMENT BY JERRY AHERN

Copyright 1989.

The FBI with the help of David Holden raid Cedar Ridge Island. They manage to destroy a key operation base of the FLNA. Dimitri Borsoi is not letting this be a setback. First he manages to steal some missiles from an Army base. Then he uses them to attack a building where a security conference is being chaired by the President. The attack kills the Vice President and puts the President in a coma. This makes Roman Makowski the radical speaker of the House the acting President. If this isn’t bad enough the FLNA sets a trap that captures David Holden the leader of the Patriots. After some sadistic torture by Borsoi, Holden is taken to Peru. As captive of a viscous drug lord they plan to either torture Holden for info or get him to switch sides. Luckily a prostitute with a heart of gold helps Holden and he manages to escape.

This book starts to turn up the action. We get the President in a coma and VP killed. This will have some serious consequences in later books. It also starts the adventures of Holden in Peru as he tries to get back home and avoid the evil drug lords. This was a good book with lots of dark stuff like people getting set on fire alive. Holden’s reaction was very believable as he seems to lose it after this incident. A good solid book.

THE DEFENDER #4 DECISION TIME BY JERRY AHERN

Copyright 1989.

The Patriots have found out that the leading candidate for major of Metro is secretly a member of the FLNA. So Luther Steel the FBI agent goes to Chicago to investigate. He finds out that the candidate is selling drugs to finance the FLNA and is also a pedophile. Meanwhile David Holden and Rosie Shepherd go undercover at a rich island development called Cedar Ridge Islands. The place is a front for the FLNA to smuggle terrorists into the country and set them up with phony IDs. This results in a confrontation with Dimitri Borsoi who is running the FLNA and him seeming to fall out of a helicopter over the ocean. Then they have to expose the mayoral candidate and ensue the elections happen in spite of FLNA attempts to stop them.

So in this book we get to see that the Patriots and the FBI are informally allied. Holden finally confronts the main baddy in Borsoi and it seems that he is killed. But he survives and at the end makes sure the winning mayoral candidate is killed by a suicide pilot crashing into this home. I enjoyed the introduction of a new character in Rocky Saddler a old Korean war vet and now private investigator. A real badass. A good book if not the greatest but the story is soon going into more exciting directions.

THE DEFENDER #3 OUT OF CONTROL BY JERRY AHERN

Copyright 1988.

David Holden and his Patriots continue their fight against the Front for the Liberation of North America(FLNA). Now it looks like he will have an ally. The President has secretly decided to ally with him. Through the FBI director Cerillia he contacts Holden. With Luther Steel an FBI agent and his special team they manage to capture an operative. Taking him to a secret base they interrogate him. Only an FLNA operative has infiltrated the FBI. They find out that Cerillia’s aid is part of the FLNA. That soon they are going to attack a special law enforcement conference in New Mexico between representatives from The U.S., Canada and Mexico. Now it is up to Holden and Steel to stop their attack.

The third book in the series gives Holden and the Patriots an ally. The President is sympathetic but has to act clandestinely because the Patriots are still an illegal group. We are introduced to Luther Steel and his special task force which now works with the Patriots. This now gives the group some much needed help in their fight. We find out that the government is infiltrated by the FLNA. It is revealed that the upcoming mayoral election for the fictional city of Metro may have a possible FLNA man in the lead. This was a good solid entry in the series. It continues to set up this world and it’s characters. We get some more on how ruthless the FLNA is when they kill the families of defense contractors. A interesting story filled with action and plot development.

THE DEFENDER #2 THE KILLING WEDGE BY JERRY AHERN

Copyright 1988.

Rufus Burroughs died stopping the nuclear power plant attack and now David Holden is the leader of the Patriots. First business is burying Rufus next to his wife. Then it is getting back to organizing the Patriots to take on the FLNA. The FLNA has meanwhile hired a British assassin named Warlock. He has two missions. To kill David Holden and the current director of the FBI. The hit on the FBI director is supposed to be made to look like the Patriots did it. David and his girlfriend Rosie get involved with a fight with the FLNA in their abandoned subway system of Metro. Then they have to stop Warlock from killing the FBI director.

The second book isn’t as good as the first. The part where they are in the subway system does drag a bit. I will say that this series is much more darker then the Survivalist. First we have the main character’s wife and children killed in the first book. Now in this one they rescue a young 12 year old girl from the FLNA who was kidnapped and raped after killing the girl’s parents. Then this girl dies in a shoot out with the police. This book is setting up that the police are out to get the Patriots as much as the FLNA. Also sets up that the FBI director is interested in working clandestinely with the Patriots. The book starts to establish the romance between Holden and Rosie. A flawed book in some ways but showing promise for the series as a whole.

THE DEFENDER #1 THE BATTLE BEGINS BY JERRY AHERN

Copyright 1988.

David Holden is a history professor in the fictional southern city of Metro. He lives a quiet life with his wife and three children but that is soon to change. For a KGB agent named Dimitri Borsoi has come to start a terrorist movement to overthrow the government. Recruiting street gangs plus bringing in foreign terrorists they form the Front for the Liberation of North America the FLNA. One of their first attacks kills his wife and children. The governments heavy handed response eventually force Holden to join with The Patriots. A group of former military and police that are fighting the FLNA. He has to stop the FLNA from destroying a nuclear reactor. A success that sees the leader killed and Holden assuming control of the group.

The first thing I noticed about this book way back when was how similar to the Chuck Norris movie Invasion USA. I mean he practically lifted the plot from the movie. A KGB agent that starts a terrorist campaign with street gangs and foreign terrorists. This book was a fun read that seemed a little far fetched back when it came out. Nowadays the FLNA could be Antifa and many of our major cities do look like warzones. Politicians and the media downplaying the problem. Yeah Jerry may have been very prescient when it comes to predicting the future.

Holden is a very likable character that is just an ordinary guy caught up in events. Of course he is a former SEAL so it explains why he is such an expert. The idea of a terrorist organization using violence to get a government to crack down and in effect drive more people to the terrorists is a real theory. It was used by many groups including the Shining Path in Peru and Islamic groups in Egypt and Algeria in the nineties. None so far had the desired effect. Ahern wrote the popular The Survivalist series and this while not as good is an enjoyable action series from the eighties and nineties.

ENDWORLD #31 FREEDOM RUN BY DAVID ROBBINS

Copyright 2021.

The Family has decided to investigate why they never hear from the Free State of California and sent the Alpha Triad. Blade, Hickok and Geronimo use the time travel device and end up in Northern California. They soon find that the state is under martial law and terrorized by unknown mutant creatures. Thousands are missing as the state becomes a dictatorship. Blade soon finds out the Lords of Kismet have managed to take over. Using the shapeshifting Gualon they have replaced Governor Melnick and key personnel in state government. Now the Alpha Triad has to expose to the people of California that their government is not under their control.

The next installment of the new Endworld series goes back to its roots. First it has restored the run in the title. It has the original warriors that this series started out with and visits a familiar place. Since the series was revived the Family has been all but alone in their fight against the Lords of Kismet. Now they are actively starting to reform the old Freedom Federation. They start with the most powerful of the members the Free State of California. Robbins really has a firm grasp on the characters for they feel just like when I read this series back in the eighties and nineties. This was one of the best of the post-apocalypse series back in the day and I am glad to see it continue to thrive and move in new and exciting directions.

MOSTLY HARMLESS BY DOUGLAS ADAMS

Copyright 1992.

Arthur Dent has just lost his girlfriend Fenchurch to some random space/time abnormality that erased her from existence. He also is lost in an alternate reality and finds the Earth a very completely different and dismal place. While traveling his ship crashes and he becomes the sandwich maker for a primitive tribe. His life as sandwich maker is fulfilling when Trillian comes with her daughter Random. Random is also Arthur’s daughter because Arthur was selling his DNA and Trillian used it to conceive a daughter. Trillian has to go and leaves Random for Arthur to take care of.

Soon after a package comes from Ford that Random opens and finds is the new Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. A new owner of the publishing company has created this sinister new edition. Now Random takes it to another alternate Earth where that Trillian never left with Zaphod and is a reporter. This Trillian finds a race of aliens living on the tenth planet and they are suffering amnesia. Well through some convoluted process Arthur, Ford and both Trillians get together just as the Vogons are about to destroy all the alternate Earths.

The final entry in the Hitchhiker’s story. The title coming from the entry for Earth in the guide. Sadly this wasn’t very good. It had a dark tone to it . A convoluted storyline and lots of theoretical jibber-jabber that wasn’t very funny. Indeed there were many plot threads left hanging and the ending was a dismal one that saw all the Earth’s in every universe destroyed by the Vogons. Douglas Adams in an interview admitted he was not very happy with this book. That he was going though some bad personal problems that year.

This was the last book he would ever write before his untimely death in 2001. He wasn’t a very prolific writer but what he wrote was brilliant. His Hitchhiker books were something I loved and consider then to be the most funniest thing ever written. It is sad that he didn’t end with a high note. Still I am glad I finally got around to reading this. It brings some closure for me and the book did have some moments. I guess the lesson from this is don’t try to write humor when your going through some bad personal problems.

SO LONG, AND THANKS FOR ALL THE FISH BY DOUGLAS ADAMS

Copyright 1984.

Arthur Dent after traveling the galaxy discovers that Earth still exists. He goes back to find the planet continuing on as if nothing happened. Everyone thinks the Vogon fleet was some CIA mind control experiment. There are two things though that changed. One is all the dolphins disappeared. The second is Arthur finds his house that was demolished is still standing. Along the way he meets a woman name Fenchurch. Fenchurch had a mental breakdown after the event and feels she knew something important. Their quest takes them to California and a man named Wonko the Sane who knows about the dolphins saving Earth. He decided that all of society is insane after reading the instructions posted on a toothpick box on how to use a toothpick. The two eventually meet up with Ford Prefect and hitch a ride on a passing spaceship to a planet that has God’s final message to the universe.

So the trilogy was so successful it would obviously get a fourth book. Back in the first it was established that the doIphins were the second most intelligent species on Earth. Apparently they managed to save the planet. There final message being the title. I think this is my favorite of the whole series. It takes place mostly on Earth and has some very funny observations on the planet. It also has a beautiful love story that Adams gave Dent. Well needless to say they do get off the planet and find God’s final message. Written in fiery letters on a planet that is a tourist trap. The message is pure Adams and was a very satisfying ending to the book.